


Partners in Crime

by HandsomeHyperion



Category: Oiled Machine
Genre: Anxiety Disorder, Arlen is unstable and dangerous, Death, Depression, Eventual Smut, Excessive Swearing, General Mental Instability, Love At First Murder, Medication, Mental Illness, Murder, Nonbinary Character, Original Character(s), Other, Robbery, Salem doesnt care, Salem says Fuck a lot, Suicidal Thoughts, Violence, Visual Hallucinations, auditory hallucinations
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-23
Updated: 2017-01-23
Packaged: 2018-09-19 11:02:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,302
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9437255
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HandsomeHyperion/pseuds/HandsomeHyperion
Summary: Two mentally unstable people who frequent the same therapy office end up in a wild set of circumstances that, against all odds, end up pushing them closer together instead of driving them apart as it should.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Howdy. This work is old, and I'm much too tired to edit or finish it. If you like it regardless, thank you.  
> Arlen belongs to my dearest friend Sesshin.

You fucking hated this waiting room. It always smelled like mildew and old people, and you fucking hated having to sit next to all the crazy motherfuckers in here. Like that one guy that was always talking about how the president was Satan, and his neighbor down the street was actually Jesus Christ risen again. You hated how the other people would sometimes stare at you suspiciously, and how some of them wanted to talk to you and chat it up like you'd been friends forever. You hated the people that worked there and the way they treated you like a toddler as if your brain was mush enough that you had to have your hand held and head patted, and how they also stared at you suspiciously as if you would go off at any moment. You ESPECIALLY hated your therapist who insisted you call her Sharon. She was one of those types that tried to act like they were your friend, and wore those uppity rich people clothes with the tacky pearls draped around their scrawny little necks and had that really obnoxious way of talking to you that somehow sounded belittling even though their word choice wasn't.  
  
You hated everything about this fucking place. Everything, that is, except for the man that would sometimes catch your eye and give you a genuine smile. This man never seemed to look at you like you were a ticking time bomb, no matter how dour your mood appeared to be, and you're almost positive he would strike up a conversation with you if it weren't for the fact that you were always about to go into the office when he got there, and how you were gone before his own appointment was over.  
  
Some days you thought about staying and waiting for him to come out so you could chat with him, but by the time you got out of your appointment you just wanted to go home, so you never got the chance. It eventually got to a point that the gorgeous stranger became the highlight of your week, and you started to give small tentative smiles back. If you didn't know better you'd think this actually seemed to brighten his own mood some, but you were never much of an optimist and dismissed the notion. It didn't help that he was absolutely gorgeous. The man had to be at LEAST 6'5", and was built like he was meant for breaking things- the guy would easily dwarf you at your measly 5'5". He had one of those golden tans that made him seem to absolutely glow, with long chestnut hair and the most amazing pair of emerald eyes you'd ever seen in your life (which you were absolutely jealous of, what with your plain brown eyes). All of this was offset by the fact that he seemed a bit unhinged- something in those eyes giving him away as someone not to fuck with if you wanted to stay alive and in one piece. So, all in all, totally your fucking type.  
  
As if on cue- the stranger you'd just been thinking about came into the waiting room and seemed to scan it for a moment before settling his gaze on you and grinning at you as per the norm. Damn you wished you at least knew his name. Today you can't really muster the energy to smile back but give him a pleasant little wave so he doesn't feel like you're blowing him off, leveling a tired look his way as he beams brighter, looking like he wants to come over. Unfortunately, your name gets called right as he seems to make up his mind and you shoot him an apologetic glance before standing and shuffling back into the office to get his fucking appointment over with. It's probably for the best that you never talked though, you supposed. Mixing crazy with crazy didn't seem to ever work out for you, if Sascha was any indication.  
  
You can't help but scowl as your ex worms his way into your thoughts again, and you fling yourself down into your therapists chair with an angry huff. Naturally, she notices this and you get to spend your session talking about why you're angry and reflecting on why you still feel this way even though it's been years since you broke it off with the vicious mobster. Sharon wasn't a bad person, but some days she made you want to ring her scrawny fucking neck with her constant probing and demanding you try to make sense of your feelings. Today was turning out to be one of those days. You do your best to grit out answers to her questions as you glared holes into her stupid motivational posters- they just HAD to be the unbearable kiddy looking ones with the stupid cat hanging off the stupid fucking branch fucking telling you to 'HANG IN THERE!"  
  
Not for the first time, you found yourself thinking "Fuck you Sharon and your stupid fucking posters, and your stupid fucking fake smile, and your stupid fucking 'rich white bitch' clothes." Sharon of course has no clue that you're about ten seconds away from slapping that false smile right off of her face, and continues droning on about your recovery plan until she uses up your hour. You thank whatever gods may exist when your time is up and flee the stuffy office before she gets the chance to finish talking. Normally you'd  tear your way out of the suffocating waiting room so fast in your desperation to escape that you'd damn near knock one of the other patients over, but today you bring yourself to stop at the desk in the front and level a patient smile at the lady behind the counter until she acknowledges you.  
  
"Can I help you sir?" the obnoxious woman asks in her overly sweet voice, strained smile plastered on her face as usual. You resist the urge to roll your eyes at her and continue smiling politely back at her as you respond.  
  
  
"Yes, actually, I was wondering if you could tell me the name of one of the other patients here? I understand if it's confidential, but we've talked several times and I've never had the chance to ask him what it is and was hoping you could help me out." you lie through your teeth, hoping she didn't pay enough attention to the patients in the waiting room to be able to call you on your bullshit, "He's the really tall man with the bright green eyes, and the brown hair? Looks like he could probably bench press me if he wanted to?"  
  
  
The woman gives you a strange look for a moment before sighing and answering you, "That's Arlen. I can't tell you any more than that though. Technically I wasn't supposed to tell you his first name either, but.." here she shrugs before pointedly turning away to pretend to do some filing, signaling that she's done talking to you.  
  
You don't even bother to thank her before turning to go, smirking to yourself for having gotten his name. When you finally get out you fish around in your pockets and draw out your cigarettes with slightly shaking hands, taking a deep drag without even pausing on your way to your car. Sharon still had you all riled up, and you wanted to punch someone, but you took a moment to preen at having learned something about the man in the waiting room, as .. creepy as asking behind his back seemed. Arlen. The name fit.  
  
You thought once more about waiting for him to get out of his appointment, but there's no way in Hell you can make yourself stay at this fucking place any longer than you had to be. Sharon always put you in the worst of moods and more often than not you found yourself wanting to get into a fight if only for an excuse to hurt someone. The poor guy from the waiting room didn't deserve to deal with your bullshit, so it was with a disappointed sigh that you put your car in reverse and tore out of the parking lot to go home.  
  
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Your shitty day just gets even shittier as you let yourself into your apartment and shuffle into the kitchen just to realize you're completely out of groceries as you open up the fridge. You seriously don't have the energy to go to the store to get more, so you just say fuck it and slam the door closed again, going to the living area to collapse face-first onto the sofa and just lay there miserably. You give a loud groan of irritation into the cushions and sincerely hope you end up smothering yourself that way, just putting you out of your misery. Sadly for you, this does not happen, and after about ten minutes of laying there you get bored and sit back up, your gaze focusing on the table in front of your couch where you kept all your important shit, like bills you wait till the last minute to pay, and your meds.  
  
You heave a great sigh as you focus your gaze on the pill bottles on your coffee table, wishing they'd all just disappear and stop reminding you that you're broken. It's been almost a month since you took any of them besides the anxiety pill, which started innocently enough as you just forgetting but eventually turned into you just not giving a shit anymore. You can't say it was a good decision to just stop, since you were getting drastically unstable again and found yourself falling back to your idle suicide plans that mostly consisted of hoping random happenstance would take you out so you wouldn't have to do it yourself. Your most visited plan tended to involve car wrecks or drunk drivers slamming into you either while you were driving or walking down the block, but the world seems to work against you and keep you safe on the roads.  
  
It's not like anyone would miss you. You had no friends left after leaving Sascha, never had any family to begin with, and you refused to get pets in case your depression hit again and you stopped taking care of them. The only person you could see being remotely sad you were gone was MAYBE that guy from the therapists office, but even then he'd forget all about you after a while. It's not like you'd ever talked anyway, which of course was more your fault than anything. If only Sharon wasn't so fucking unbearable, maybe you could have made a friend.  
  
You gave an angry snarl at the little bottles and slapped them off of the table, shooting them dirty looks as they clattered and rolled across the floor. You fucking hated your meds. Hated that you needed them to function. Hated how you felt while you were on them, but also hated how you felt without them. There was no winning this battle. You were miserable either way. Without the meds you drowned in your crippling depression and anxiety and had to deal with your mind plotting against you in the form of auditory and visual hallucinations, but if you were on them you just became more self-aware and had to realize how fucked up you were. At least while you were drowning you didn't have to acknowledge the problem.  
  
You groaned and rubbed at your face tiredly, wishing you could fucking sleep without the Seroquel. Today was day three of no sleep and it was starting to take it's toll on you. It didn't help that you had to go to the bank this week and drop off the cash you'd made off of your most recent commission. It always amazed you when people wanted your weird ass paintings, but you weren't gonna complain. Gave you grocery money. Doesn't mean you had to like going to the bank and talking to the teller though. They were always friendly enough, but you HATED social interaction. It'd always been easier to just ignore everyone and let Sascha do all the talking for you. At least with Sascha no one ever expected you to pretend you were a normal person with some semblance of manners. Smile and wave for the camera, oh how are you today, I'm fine thank you how about you, oh I'm good thank you for asking. NO ONE IS FINE, YOUR MANNERS ARE A LIE.  
  
You can't help but chuckle to yourself at this. You always did get a little ridiculous when you were tired. Maybe it was about time you try and turn in, catch some Z's before you had to adult again tomorrow. Tomorrow was an off day so you could laze away in the bed for a while before actually having to get anything done, so that would be nice. If you went to bed now you would be able to get at LEAST 12 hours of sleep if you managed to drift off. It was this thought that had you heaving a hefty sigh as you got up off the couch and trudging off to the bedroom, just stripping along the way, almost tripping over the clothes and trash littered about. You could deal with it tomorrow. You always dealt with everything 'tomorrow'. Which of course meant never. Why bother picking it up, it was just gonna end up in the floor again anyway.  
  
You collapsed naked into the bed, burying your face into the cold pillow, and for once actually managed to drift off the moment you relaxed into the sheets, the last conscious thought you have being of a certain strangers friendly smile before you fall into the comforting blackness of dreamless sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading. I hope you enjoyed it. Maybe one day I'll pick it back up.


End file.
